Unidentified donor provides a third of pro-GOP group’s funds

By Heidi Przybyla, Bloomberg News •April 17, 2012 9:50 pm

WASHINGTON — Crossroads Grassroots Policy Strategies, a nonprofit group affiliated with Republican adviser Karl Rove, got more than one-third of its revenue in the last seven months of 2011 from a single, unidentified donor, according to documents filed with the IRS.

According to the forms, $10 million of the group’s revenue from June 1 to Dec. 31, 2011, which totaled $28.4 million, came from the donor. The next highest contribution, from a different donor, was $4.3 million, according to the forms.

Nonprofits incorporated as 501(c)(4) organizations, such as Crossroads GPS, don’t have to identify their donors, unlike groups operating expressly as political action committees. Crossroads GPS spent more than $17 million on ads to help elect Republicans in 2010, Federal Election Commission reports show.

“I’m quite certain this is where the corporate money is going,” said Craig Holman, a lobbyist for Public Citizen, an advocacy group favoring stronger campaign finance laws. “For the most part, the wealthy individuals who want the president to know who paid for the White House are in the super-PACs. The corporations who don’t want their customers to know who they’re funding are in the 501cs.”

Crossroads said it took in $77 million from June 1, 2010, through Dec. 31, 2011. It also received a single contribution of $10.1 million before June 1, 2011, as well as donations of $5 million, $4.5 million and $4 million.

The group shared its largesse with other Republican-leaning nonprofits. Crossroads contributed $500,000 to the American Action Network, headed by former Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minn., which spent more than $19 million on ads to elect Republicans in 2010; and $50,000 to the 60 Plus Association, which supports privatizing Social Security and spent more than $7 million on ads on behalf of Republican congressional candidates in 2010.

“We see this kind of cross-fertilization of like-minded groups as crucial to building an infrastructure for long-term policy change,” said Jonathan Collegio, a Crossroads spokesman. “We plan to do a lot more of it.”

Crossroads also gave $3.7 million to the National Federation of Independent Business, which is suing to overturn Barack Obama’s health care law that expands coverage to millions of uninsured Americans. NFIB reported spending more than $1 million on ads to help elect Republicans in 2010, as well as another $1.5 million that it kept hidden and said was exempt from requirements that it disclose campaign spending.